


Settle

by Ladycat



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-12
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-12 03:08:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Xander never really understood stillness before this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Settle

Stillness.

Xander never really understood _stillness_ before this. He was a teenaged boy, constantly hopped up on sugar, caffeine, and more energy than a gawkily growing body could handle. Being still? For longer than the three nanoseconds it took for him to start feeling wired again, with the hop-scotching thump of his heart twitching underneath his skin? These were things no teenage boy could handle. Even normal ones.

Of which he pretty much wasn’t. Maybe not ever. Definitely not now.

Shadows chased each other across the floor, puppies tumbling underneath the waving curtains. He still wasn’t entirely sure about leaving the window open, but he’d been bluntly informed that if Xander _didn’t_ leave them open, then Angel would risk burning his hands to open them up.

_“You need fresh air, Xander. I can’t make sure you get sunlight, but I can make sure you breathe.”_

Like closed windows meant suffocation.

Well...

Xander pushed that thought away, rolling onto his back with hands tucked behind his head. He hadn’t thought about it, much. He didn’t _want_ to, even now, but it was getting harder to keep it shoved under his mental carpet—dark berber with speckles in grey and blue—and safely ignorable. Angel didn’t want him to ignore it, anymore. And what Angel wanted, Xander was slowly discovering, Angel pretty much got.

“I thought I was the brooder.”

“No, you’re the sulker,” Xander fired back, without moving. He had finally convinced himself—been convinced?—that he didn’t have to roll over and look at Angel when they spoke, or any of the normal tricks he usually indulged in. He could just lay there, listening to his own heartbeat and the soft brush of curtains over smooth floor. He could relax. Let go.

“When you spill blood all over my suit? Yeah, I sulk then.”

Xander flinched, stomach muscles tightening in a subconscious need to curl into a ball. He hadn’t meant to. He’d been trying to be _nice_ —except that was impossible, for Xander. So when he’d taken the bag out, burning his fingers on almost-melted plastic, he’d yelped and dropped and blood had gone everywhere.

“Hey.” Angel sat on the bed beside him, hand on Xander’s belly, rubbing gently. His hand was bigger than Xander’s. The fingers were long and white, the nails perfectly manicured. “Xander, I’m not mad at you. I wasn’t mad at you then, and I’m not mad at you now.”

He shrugged. The need to pull his arms down and curl up was even stronger now, but Angel knew his weakness. “I still messed up.”

“It was an accident.” Cool skin wormed underneath Xander’s shirt to rub heated. “I’m not going to be angry about an accident. Although, if you do it again... ”

He meant it as a joke. Xander _knew_ that. It still didn’t stop the burst of terror Xander frantically tried to tamp down. Angel knew, though, or he felt it or understood it or _something_ , because suddenly Xander was on his side with Angel spooned up behind him. The hand on his belly hadn’t moved during the whole time, keeping him malleable with that constant, mellow touch.

“I’m sorry.”

Angel _shh_ ed against the back of his neck, ruffling the ends of his hair the way the breeze outside did. Would, if he was outside. He wasn’t much, anymore. Here to school, then back from the library to here. He didn’t patrol more than once a week, and then only when Angel was with them.

Buffy didn’t get it. She missed him, she said, but whenever they were together the sidelong looks appeared and the snapping start up. Xander didn’t blame her, at all—seeing your ex-boyfriend cuddle up with your friend had to be painful—but he couldn’t handle the taunts, either. So he gave into the desire to be _away_ , and simply was.

Willow got it. Willow always got it. Willow often walked him back to the mansion rather than make him wait for Angel to come find him. She didn’t talk about anything Xander didn’t want her to, restricting her conversation to spells with Giles or school or other silly gossip, if they spoke at all. The transition from babbling, wise-cracking chatterbox to Xander’s current quite weirded everyone but Willow out; she knew better.

“Giles is asking.”

Angel’s forehead pressed against the curve of Xander’s skull, soaking up the warmth. His nose was a point of coolness, almost tickling. The strength of his body always calmed Xander; he _hated_ feeling little, like a child, but Angel’s bulk didn’t seem to do that. It was just there, Prudential firm. Not mocking or condescending, just _there_.

Xander cataloged all these sensations, filing them away for the times when Angel wasn’t there and he felt little in the bad way. When he was waiting, switching between homework and the television and trying not to call the pager Angel had purchased, just to make sure.

“Xander... you have to tell someone. Someone _alive._ ”

Shaking his head led to other kinds of shaking, but still Xander said nothing. Angel held him, eventually turning him so that Xander could tuck his head underneath a square jaw, totally surrounded and covered and warm and safe and never, ever, go, please, don’t ever go, please please... 

“Shh. It’s okay, Xander. No one’s making you go back.”

Xander rubbed his face into the soft suede of Angel’s maroon shirt, only vaguely aware that he had arms and legs both wrapped around Angel’s body. “Can’t promise that.”

“Yes, I can. Giles can.”

What?

“Xander... ” Unable to rub his belly to calm Xander, Angel transferred his attention to Xander’s ever-shaggier locks, running his fingers through them over and over again. “He knows, Xander. He’s already contacted a lawyer. You’re sixteen and you can be emancipated. As soon as everything’s ready, he’ll take you to sign the necessary paperwork. I’ll be with you.”

Sniffling. Dammit, he was _sniffling_. “Have to go to court,” he said against Angel’s chest. “Have to be seen.”

Angel cupped his chin, forcing his face up until his eyes had no choice but to follow. “You’ll be okay.”

The laughter hurt, bubbles of acid clogging his throat and sending oil into his lungs. Xander wheezed out a broken laugh, returning his nose and mouth to the comforting haven of Angel’s chest. He’d spent a lot of time in that position. He didn’t remember most of it, but that position meant _safe_ and _secure_ the way little else did. “I’m not okay. I’m insane.”

Angel’s chuckle was a surprise, enough that he went totally still. It was easy to be still, now. Sometimes. When he was like this, and the quiet of _Angel_ seeped into his bones. Past the healing wounds, the healed scars, to the history imprinted on his bones, the core of him that hated the constant tension, the driving need to _keep going_. Here, the solitude wasn’t lonely, just tranquil. It wasn’t anticipatory, just safe.

For the first time in his life, Xander didn’t feel hunted. And it hurt. 

It hurt more than understanding what hunted him. More than running and hiding and even being caught. It hurt because he didn’t know how to deal. He’d spent his life understanding that he was prey. To suddenly change... 

“That’s okay,” Angel whispered into his hair, so close Xander didn’t need to hear it. He felt it, in his bones. “I’m good with insane.”

And Xander laughed.


End file.
